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How to eat American restaurant food without leaving home

December 16, 2008

I blogged about this topic briefly in passing, but now I think it’s deserves it’s own post. A while back, I got the book Top Secret Restaurant Recipes: Creating Kitchen Clones from America’s Favorite Restaurant Chains by Todd Wilbur (also available at Amazon.de) and it’s follow-up Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2. It’s been nine months [...]

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How to dress like a German

September 12, 2008

It’s a topic many travelers to and expats in Germany wonder about at some point: how do I blend in with the locals?
In my travels throughout Germany, I’ve found it pretty easy to pick out Americans, even the ones dressing incognito. I’ve developed “American Radar.” There’s a way Americans carry themselves: a certain [...]

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Dealing with ticks

May 19, 2008

If it’s summer, it’s tick season. I’ve already found three ticks on Charlie this week.
In Germany, when it comes to tick-borne diseases, you mostly need to worry about Frühsommer-Meningoenzephalitis (FSME) known in English as tick-borne meningoencephalitis (for folks who can read German, the Frühsommer-Meningoenzephalitis Wikipedia article is much more informative) and Borreliose (Lyme disease).
There [...]

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Sorting Trash in Germany

March 10, 2008

Germans take recycling very seriously. I’ve heard of fights erupting among neighbors in apartment houses over improper sorting. To help you with figuring out what goes where, I’ve compiled this little guide.
First, there can be up to four containers at your residence or in public places. There’s the paper and cardboard container, that is denoted by either green or blue, [...]

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The Great Vanilla Extract Experiment

February 28, 2008

For six years, I’ve brought a large bottle of vanilla extract home with me from the States every year. While living in Berlin, I considered the tiny, overpriced bottles available at KaDeWe. I searched expat and gourmet shops. I searched online. I looked at recipes. To be honest, it doesn’t look that difficult to make your own, [...]

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Where to find a used car in Germany

February 10, 2008

I am in no way an expert on purchasing a car, so all I’m doing is giving you some tips on locating used cars that are for sale. First, if you require an automatic, your pickings will be much slimmer, and with larger cars, generally limited to the luxury models. This was my [...]

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What’s good at Aldi?

November 20, 2007

last updated 8 October 2008
I avoided the discount supermarket Aldi for a long time because, although I’d heard there was really good stuff in there, I had also heard there was stuff to avoid, and I didn’t have a lifetime of experience knowing the good from the bad.
So now I am presenting you an Aldi [...]

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